usatoday24

We can reach a black hole with a billion euros and a nave of the size of a clip

by

The boldest ideas are those that often drive the greatest jumps in human knowledge. AND bold It is the best way to describe this study supported by the National Foundation of Natural Sciences of China. The objective: travel to the darkest secrets of the universe. Short. A astrophysicist from Fudan University, in Shanghai, has designed a plan to send a micronave the size and weight of a clip to the black hole closest to the Earth. The propulsion method? A potent system of lasers fired from our planet. Led by Cosimo Bambi, the exotic proposal intends Test the limits of Einstein’s relativity theory in one of the most extreme environments of the cosmos. Although technology to carry it out is not yet developed, advances in nanotechnology, laser propulsion and detection of black holes could come true in the coming decades. A black hole to discover. The mission of reaching a black hole has two huge challenges. The first is to find a viable goal. The nearest black hole we know, Gaia-Bh1is 1,560 light years. However, our cosmological models tell us that there could be a much closer black hole, “only” 20 or 25 light years of us. “There are new techniques to discover black holes”, Bambi says in a statement. “I think it is reasonable to expect that we can find a nearby one in the next decade.” An odyssey of a century: Once the objective is located, the second challenge will be to get there. Current spacecraft, chemical propulsion, are too slow. The solution proposed by Bambi are nanonaves at a scale of a few grams that only contain a microchip and A solar candle 10 square meters. A set of high -power lasers from Earth could point towards the candle, accelerating the ship to a third of the speed of light. Even at that rate, the trip to a black hole to 20 light years would last for about 70 years. The data to be collected would take another two decades to return to the earth, which places the total duration of the mission around 80 or 100 years. Many reasons to try. If the mission is successful, the experiments that these probes can perform near the black hole would answer some of the deepest unsolved questions of modern physics. Is there really a horizon of events? You could try if the non -return border of a black hole behaves how the theories predict, observing the probe signal while falling towards it. Is Einstein’s general relativity valid? Nanonave’s orbit would be used to detect any Minimum deviation of Kerr’s predictionswhich describes the spacetime around a black hole in rotation. Does the fundamental constants change? The mission could verify whether constants such as fine structure vary in such an intense gravitational field. It would not be cheap. The plan is tremendously speculative. Only the laser system would cost around a billion euros. “It may sound really crazy and, in a sense, closer to science fiction,” admits Cosimo Bambi. However, milestones such as the detection of gravitational waves or the photograph of the shadow of a black hole also seemed impossible in its day. Image | Event Horizon Telescope In Xataka | We have dedicated six years to process images of a black hole to reach a conclusion: Einstein was right

The skeptics of the AI warned that we were exciting a lot and we did not believe them: the AI is tontal

by

GPT-5 is something better that GPT-4. The problem of that phrase is in the word “something.” Openai’s new “unified” model does not seem to represent the qualitative leap that many expected, and that The alarms have sounded again. One might ask what if the AI no longer becomes much better than it is now? But maybe that is already happening and the question is another: what do we do then? The climb works, but less. In 2020 a team of Openai researchers published A study entitled “Laws of climbing for neuronal language models”. They raised a kind of Moore law of the AI: the more data and computation dedicated to training models, the better they would be. That observation was clearly demonstrated when they launched GPT-3, which was 10 times larger than GPT-2 but it was a lot, much better than that model. Deceleration. Gary Marcus, professor of psychology and neuronal sciences at the University of New York, explained in 2022 That this study did not make much sense: “The so -called lawyer laws are not universal laws such as gravity, but simply mere observations that could not be maintained forever.” Even Satya Nadella agreed With this statement a few months ago in the Ignite 2024 event. And as we are seeing, their doubts have come true. The climb works and the models are somewhat better than their predecessors, but The deceleration seems to be there. But GPT-5 is not so bad. The truth is that GPT-5 has improved in relevant metrics. Those responsible for Epoch AI They evaluated His behavior in FrontiermathFor example. The results were a bit better than their O4-mini predecessor, but there were no big yield jumps. Even so, they highlighted how GPT-5 has been the first model to solve a specific problem as if “had fully understood the problem.” In the field of mathematics, GPT-5 behaves something better than its predecessors, but the difference is not radical. The most difficult problems (Tier 4) are still almost impossible for AI models. Source: Epoch AI. And think better. Another independent analysis of the ZVI Mowshowitz analyst He pointed out that although the GPT-5 base model It was correct without further adoits advanced variants (GPT-5 PRO and GPT-5 Thinking) were a substantial improvement with respect to O3-PRO and O3 respectively, especially when mitigating hallucinations. According to your data, “GPT-5 Auto” (the base version) seems like a poor product unless you use the free chatgpt plan “. The same what we need is a symbolic AI. The symbolic (“classic”) represents knowledge using symbols and rules, and is based on logic and formal reasoning to solve problems and make decisions. This type of AI He dominated the panorama From AI until 90, but the lack of notable advances made that discipline stagnate and live a winter of AI. “We leave” with the connectionist, the neural networks that represent knowledge through connections and weights of the nodes of a network of artificial neurons. This discipline was the one that gave rise to the ia generative and the overwhelming success of Chatgpt and its rivals. His surprising good behavior unleashed the current AI fever, But performance advances are slowing down. The skeptics of the AI redouble their speech. Analysts like Ed Zitron – more extreme – or Gary Marcus – defense of the symbolic AI— They have always warned of the exaggerated expectations generated by the generative AI. Even those who were instrumental in the creation of Chatgpt, such as engineer Ilya Sutskever, They warned of the scaling limitations. Reasoning models have softened criticism and are a great alternative for that apparent stagnation of standard models, but even with them the feeling is that AI will not go much further. Thus we will never get to an AGI. Thomas Wolf, co -founder and Chief Science officer of Hugging Face, reflected on the problem A few months ago and concluded that the IAS have become “a country of men who say yes to all servers.” For him things began to be disturbing: “To create an Einstein in a data center we do not need a system that has all the answers, but rather one that is able to wonder things that nobody had thought or nobody had dared to ask.” As this expert pointed out, the current AI does not generate (usually) new knowledge, and “simply fills the holes of what humans already knew.” The current AI is like a fantastic and very applied student, but that student does not challenge what has been taught. He does not question it and does not propose ideas that go against the data with which he has been trained. Yann Lecun, one of the pioneers of the AI, has already concluded on the current generative AI: It’s silly. Lowering expectations. The panorama is worrying for those who are investing billions of dollars in data centers or in training new foundational models, especially because that impact may not be as gigantic as they had forecast and promised. Ed Zitron indicated In The New Yorker that “this is a 50,000 million dollar market, not one of one billion dollars.” Marcus agreed. “50,000 million, yes. Maybe 100,000.” What happens if AI has stagnated. If it is effectively, what we can expect is that AI becomes a useful tool to save time and improve the result of certain tasks – it is doing it – but not to provoke That seismic impact In society and employment What personalities such as Altman, Musk, Amodei or Zuckerberg defend with their investments. If that happens we will undoubtedly have a powerful tool to do things better and faster. That was just what allowed us other fantastic disruptions such as the PC or the Internet. But many probably expected more. A lot more. And there is the problem. In expectations. Image | Levart Photography In Xataka | There are too many AI models. That raises a true death sentence for Anthropic and Claude

He wants to charge a commission to Nvidia and AMD, and he doesn’t know if he can do it

by

In the middle of last April the US Department of Commerce imposed new restrictions to the export to China of the GPU for artificial intelligence (AI) H20 of Nvidia, which in practice caused this chip to stop reaching the Chinese clients of this company. After weeks of negotiations, and even, of several “face to face” Between Donald Trump and Jensen Huang, Nvidia has made the Department of Commerce allow him to re -give his Chinese clients its H20 chip. However, this permission has not left for free: hereinafter will deliver to the US government 15% of income which will obtain in China for the sale of this and other GPU. AMD has run this same luck, so there is no doubt that this Trump administration strategy establishes an unpublished precedent by forcing some US companies to deliver to the State a percentage of their sales income in another country. Nvidia and AMD have accepted this condition, but it is perfectly possible that it does not prosper. The export clause favors them. Not even the government is convinced that its strategy is legal In the current scenario it is surprising that the US administration has reached this agreement with Nvidia and AMD without making sure before what is pursued is legal. But it is just what has happened. Karoline Leavitt, White House spokeswoman, has made this statement: “At this time this agreement remains with these two companies, but could expand in the future to other companies (…) Legality and mechanics are still being resolved by the Department of Commerce.” The US government does not rule out a commission similar to that it wants to receive from NVIDIA and AMD to other companies As we have just seen, the US government does not rule out charging a commission similar to that it wants to receive from Nvidia and AMD to other companies, but it still does not have the legality of this agreement yet. And it is normal that it does not have it closed. Article I, section 9 of the US Constitution Says the following: “No tax or tariff will be imposed on the articles exported from any state.” This is the export clause that I have mentioned a few lines above. In practice, this article can cancel the collection of the commission of 15% to NVIDIA and AMD for three reasons. The first is that it is essentially an export tax, and, therefore, clearly violates this clause. In addition, the Export Control Reform Law 2018 specifically prohibits charging for export licenses. And finally, although it is not less important, this measure with all likelihood will be received as a tax by decree and without the approval of the Congress, which is the only power with the authority to impose taxes. Nvidia and AMD, on the other hand, have in their favor a precedent that can exempt them from paying the commission that the Trump administration wants to charge. In 1998 The US Supreme Court annulled a tax of port maintenance with which the government intended to tax the value of the burden that passed through US ports, including exports. That scenario was not very different from the current one. We will see if the Department of Commerce finally manages to legally cement the commission of 15% to NVIDIA and AMD. Image | Nvidia | Gage Skidmore More information | CNBC In Xataka | Ten Chinese companies in Chips and IA have allied with a common goal: to put an end to the domain of Nvidia

If Renfe believed that the summer of 2025 was being complicated is because he still did not know the worst: the fires

by

It is not being an easy summer for the bird. The campaign started with issues In one of its main arteries, the Madrid-Andalusia line, and has been challenging challenges such as The soap opera of the Avril trains, The suspension of services in several sections of the network by fire or A fault that a few days ago affected the Andalusian high speed line. Now, with a good part of the holiday country, add a new challenge that puts the tip: The paralysis of the Madrid-Galicia line. And all this with demand in record levels What happened? That fires have forced Renfe to suspend for hours its services between Madrid and Galicia. Yesterday afternoon the operator He already advanced The stoppage of the trains because the flames were close to the tracks between Vilavella and Galicia Porta and the final blockade It was confirmed hours later. The Initial idea It was resume the services today, but it could not be so. At 7.30 h the operators still They kept examining The ways to confirm that traffic will be recovered with guarantees. Shortly before ten Renfe published in X A message Informing the restoration of the service, but the decision lasted little. Hour and a half after He turned back: “For fire reactivation, the rail service between Madrid and Galicia is interrupted again.” Later Renfe went up A new tweet clarifying that he had been forced to interrupt the circulation between Puebla de Sanabria and Ourense by order of the Cecopi of Castilla y León (Civil Protection). “The traying trains will be separated in stations until the circulation is guaranteed,” he concluded. Click on the image to go to Tweet. Is it the only one affected? No. So far this fire has affected other sections in which Renfe operates. The flames have interfered in the service with greater or less reach in Castilla-La Mancha, Catalonia, Castilla y León either Estremaduraamong other points. In June A fire Between the stations of Valladolid-Campo Grande and Río Duero forced to suspend the high-speed service in the Madrid-Segovia-Valladolid and Madrid-Gijón lines and In July The flames forced to paralyze the line by which the bird that connects Madrid and Andalusia. Is it something exceptional? To a greater or lesser extent, Spain usually looks like forest fires in summer (more than more than 47,700 hectares) and It is not strange that in some cases the fire affects the rail network. In this case, the flames, especially those of Galicia, who have altered the corridor that communicates the community with Madrid for hours, they arrive, however, in a summer in which Renfe has had to deal with other challenges. The campaign began with A considerable chaos in one of the main arteries of the Spanish high speed Redee: the line between Madrid and Andalusia. A fault In a catenary between the Yeles (Toledo) and La Sagra, southwest of the Community of Madrid, affected the services that connected with the South and forced to suspend trains, generated delays and left a notable anger among the affected travelers. “We have been trapped in the middle of a plain, without electricity or bathrooms, with unbearable heat,” He denounced A user in X. Has anything else happened? That episode came shortly after, in May, the operator had to deal with Another chaotic episode in the AVE Madrid-Sevilla that left trains detained for hours and thousands of affected passengers. The reason on that occasion was not a fire, but the theft of copper cable on the tracks, which even led Renfe’s president to publicly lament how difficult it is to control the vast network of the country. “You cannot monitor 24 hours 15,000 km of network, but you will have to put more means,” assumed Álvaro Fernández de Heredia. With that backdrop, in recent weeks Renfe has faced Another controversyalthough of a quite different nature. A few days ago it transcended that Renfe has decided to do without the Avril trains (106 series) in his Madird-Barcelona line and replace them with convoys series 103. The decision comes after the operator detected technical problems in the machinery and forced him to make a ‘sudoku’ to relocate trains of series 103 and 102 to meet the demand. Is it all negative? No. Summer may be more moved than Renfe wanted, but has started with an important level of demand. A few days ago the operator launched A statement To show that Julio closed with his “best monthly historical record of travelers” in AVE and long distance. Throughout the month he counted about 3.5 million travelers, 4.6% more than in June, which held so far the “historical maximum”. The increase is based on high -speed services (AVE and AVLO), which saw how their place offer It increased by 13.9% and the flow of travelers 10.5% compared to 2024. The highest rise were registered between Madrid-Valencia and Zaragoza-Barcelona. Images | Ministry of Defense (X) and John Worth (Flickr) In Xataka | Fire have made a new high -risk activity today in Spain: living near the mountain

The food industry is living its highest price drop since 2014. There is a clear suspect: white brands

by

Manufacturers in the food sector are living an interesting phenomenon. They go up Industry prices in general, Upload the CPIgo up What they pay consumers in stores when they buy food and yet The rates That applies the food industry have been in free fall for almost a year. Moreover, the sector is facing its highest price decrease since early 2014. Behind that apparent nonsense there is a clear suspect: the effect of white brands and The fight that is getting rid of supermarkets. We explain ourselves. A percentage: 3.3%. Among the many indicators that periodically publishes the INE there is one that helps us better understand a key link of trade, which connects industry with the chain of distributors that take their merchandise to stores. The so -called Industrial Price Index (IPRI) records the oscillations in the right prices in That “first stage” of “internal market”, when the articles leave the factories and do not yet incorporate other added expenses, such as transport, marketing or VAT. Your approach is different from that of IPCwhich takes into account the prices paid by consumers. The INE calculates the IPRI for large sectors every month and sometimes the indicator leaves us some surprise, as happened in June, when it showed an annual fall of the 3.3% In the food industry. What does that mean? That month food manufacturers decided to reduce their rates. Why is it important? For what that percentage means. What reveals to us is a Price drop In the food industry, an adjustment of the rates with which the products leave the factory. The most curious thing is that this fall is not the dominant tonic in the industrial sector. On the contrary. Even beverage manufacturers saw in June how their industrial prices experienced A 2.7% rise. He IPRI General registered one 0.8% rise and if We go down to detail We observed that the indicator rose in most industrial branches. It only retreated in oil refinement, the chemical, metallurgical sector … and food. The annual IPC rate, which reflects the prices paid by consumers, also It was positive: In June it rose 2.2%. If we talk about the specific IPC of non -alcoholic foods and beverages of the purchase basket, it also grew 2.8%. It matters what … And imports when. If we look back, to the context, we observe two interesting data. The first is that the price index of the food industry has already a few months adjusting down. In June he scored a variation of -3.3%, but in May he had already done -2.7%and in April 2.2%. Actually the indicator has been going back. The second fact that we must take into account is that the food industry I had a decade without registering such a pronounced price drop. To find a major year -on -year drop, you have to go back to February 2014. What is the reason? The million dollar question. In a context of industrial inflationwith energy, a 3.5% And the increasing industrial prices, why do those in the food sector descend? In An article in which he delves into that phenomenon, Javier Romera, from The economisthe remembered yesterday that the reduction of the industry arrives in a context marked by a crucial factor: the rise of white brands and their growing competition In supermarkets. THE GREAT PULSE OF THE SECTOR. The industry price adjustment therefore coincides with a key moment for manufacturers, marked by the pulse with supermarket chains and The growing weight that white marks have (those of the distributor itself, such as Auchan, Hacondado or Seleqtia). All this also after years marked by a deep inflationary crisis that has made the big chains that manage supermarkets try to contain prices. The phenomenon is not new and Manuel Morales, manager of the IFA group, in An interview with The economist: “If they don’t react, brands are dead.” His notice, he remembered, comes in a context in which white brands have a greater weight in the linear of supermarkets. “Already almost 50% add up and will continue to grow because they have increased quality and differentiating prices is increasing,” Morales foreshadowed. With that backdrop, the food industry has begun to Cut your profitability. In the first quarter it stood at 6.81% after falling for the first time since 2022. Does the white mark grow so much? Yeah. Last year Promarca presented A report which shows that in just a five years, between 2018 and 2023, the presence of white -branded goods in supermarkets increased by 13%. The opposite path followed the articles sold with the brand of its manufacturer, which during that same period they retreated 23%. Promarca represents manufacturers and is therefore interested in, but their report provides a valuable track. Promarca estimates that in a five years they have disappeared from the super more than 3,600 Products marketed by manufacturers outside the distribution chains while theirs, those of the white brand, added 1,800 only in the feeding and hygiene sections. The calculation was made after analyzing six large chains. The Statista platform estimates that the market share of the white brands grew between 2005 and 2015, fell for a few years and would rebound again in 2019 until they were in 2024 in about 46%. Other studies consider that their mark on the linear of supermarkets is greater and already exceeds 50%. Images | Arno Senoner (UNSPLASH) and Alcampo In Xataka | The favorite ice cream in Spain are from Mercadona and have no “brand”. And there is a Valencian company making gold with them

Powerful, with good screen and NFC

by

If you had been thinking for a while, buying a Samsung smart watch, but it always backed down the price, this Samsung Galaxy Watch7 It is now very lowered in Mediamarkt. Specifically, it has a 43% discount and you can take it by 179 euros. Samsung Galaxy Watch7 – 40 mm * Some price may have changed from the last review A watch beast now at an unbeatable price The Samsung Galaxy Watch7 was market at the end of 2024 and on offer is the 40 mm model. Its circular screen has a 1.31 -inch diagonal and is available in two colors: green and cream. Monta the processor Exynos W1000 of 3nm and has a storage capacity of 32 GB. It is just Compatible with Android mobiles And it has very interesting functions such as falling falls. As far as connectivity is concerned, WiFi 5, Bluetooth 5.3, incorporates, NFC and GFP. Regarding sensors, it incorporates compass, barometer, gyroscope, accelerometer and analyzes parameters such as heart rate analysiselectrocardiogram, spo2 and temperature. Some straps that may interest you for this Samsung Galaxy Watch7 Oumida Correa Samsung for Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 * Some price may have changed from the last review Silicone strap for Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 * Some price may have changed from the last review Some of the links of this article are affiliated and can report a benefit to Xataka. In case of non -availability, offers may vary. Images | Samsung In Xataka | The best smartwatch: their analysis and videos are here In Xataka | The best price quality price. Your analysis and videos are here

The melon and watermelon

by

The watermelon and melon sector rubbed his hands before a summer that seemed favorable. However, now faces a problem that seems to be repeated throughout the sector: the prices lower than expected. The offer accumulates. The watermelon and melon campaign approaches their Ecuador with prices below the usual and that accumulate new falls, According to the latest data of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. The prices at the origin of watermelon and melon fell by 26.1 and 16.8%, respectively, the last week of July, the most recent date we have data. According to These dataAt the end of July, 24.14 euros were offered per 100 kg of watermelon, and € 33.34 / 100 kg of melon. These data are, respectively, 21.3% and 25.4% less than average. A recognizable trend … To a certain extent, the bearish trend of prices between the start of the campaign and its stabilization towards the middle of summer. The average price of the last five years used to start between € 80 per 100 kg, and then stabilize in prices between € 20 and € 40. In the case of the “toad skin” melon we see a similar trend in the prices of origin: high at the beginning of the season (close to € 120) that then stabilizes something below € 50 to go down a little more towards the end of August and early December. … but more marked. What we are seeing this year is a more marked trend. In the case of watermelon, a late starting campaign took prices near the € 100 barrierabove average. During a good part of the campaign, prices were maintained above this average, but now the bearish trend has left prices below what is usually common at this time. In the case of the price at the source of the “toad skin”, we see a similar trend: a late start of the season, with prices higher than the average (although not so superior) that have continued to descend in recent weeks. This, again, has facilitated that prices end up below the average threshold of the last five years. Good condition, low demand. The late start of the campaign and low prices disturb a sector that He showed his optimism Before a harvest, persumably, of good quality. However, as explained from the sector, this delay at the beginning of the campaign and a demand that does not conform to the offer have facilitated the accumulation of the product and, with it, The fall in prices. “Climatologically the watermelon is being very good, accompanied by the demand, but the market has no capacity to assume what is taking place,” he said in statements collected by EFEAGRO Andrés Góngora, sector responsible for COAG fruits and vegetables (Coordinator of Agricultural and Livestock Organizations). A problem of the entire sector. History is repeated in several agricultural subsectors, such as oil or cereals. After a drought that left some crops on the edge of the disappearance, an excellent hydrological year has allowed crop production to recover. Something positive in principle, the increase in supply has received as a response a shy demand, which has not been recovered in the same degree. The result of an increase in supply without increase in demand is intuitive: prices falls. The problem is that, in some cases, prices can become so low that they do not allow many farmers to recover campaign costs. We will have to see is what happens with crops such as watermelon and melon. In Xataka | From the profitability of the pistachio to the kilowatts of the sun: this is how Spanish farmers calculate today Image | Paulb75

If someone believed that national tourism had entered “crisis” this summer, Aena has something to say: at all

by

If Google and Deloitte give in the nail, in a few years Spain will be the great resort of the world. According to Your calculations In 2040 the country will receive around 110 million foreign visitors, even exceeding France or the US. Until then every summer is a fire test for national tourism. This in particular there are voices that already suggest A slowdown in destinations as relevant as Tenerife wave Costa del Sol. There is still a lot of campaign ahead to know if it will be so, but for now AENA’s data show a quite different photo. What suggests His July balance It is a record summer. What happened? That Aena has just published A balance of passengers that are especially interesting for two reasons. The first, because it offers us the ‘photo’ of July, the first strong month of the summer campaign. The second reason is that these figures point to a considerable increase in displacements, which clashes with The voices that over the last weeks They have detected signals of weakening in Spanish tourism, at least In certain regions. Aena’s report does not differentiate between those who move for vacations or other reasons, such as work, studies or to visit relatives. Nor does it distinguish between national and foreign passengers. In any case, another interesting approach provides to take the temperature to the tourism sector in July. 10 main airports July passengers % with respect to 2024 Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas 6,170,130 +0.6% Barcelona-El Prat Jt 5,540,010 +2.9% Palma de Mallorca 4,594,987 -0.1% Malaga-Costa del Sol 2,866,642 +7.8% Alicante-Elche Miguel Hdez. 2.106,991 +5.9% Ibiza 1,446,589 +0.9% Gran Canaria 1,286,184 +6.4% Valencia 1,132,402 +4.2% Tenerife-Sur 1,094,961 +1.4% Lanzarote-César Manrique 798,998 +7.3% Total Aena’s network in Spain 32,765,284 +2.7% What do the data say? That July 2025 was a month of record. The network of terminals managed by AENA on Spanish soil accounted for 32.76 million of travelers. The number of flights amounted to 268,034. They are, respectively, 2.7% and 3.1% more than during the same period of 2024 and mark a milestone in the historical registry of the group. “Passenger and operations figures represent an absolute monthly record, which makes last July the best month in history at the airports of the Aena network in Spain,” concrete The operator. Is there more data? Yes. In the report AENA does not detail why users, their destinations fly or if they are national or foreign travelers, but it does require how traffic has evolved in their airports. At the head in absolute terms, Barajas is located, in Madrid, with 6.17 million travelers in July. The most interesting thing, however, are not the total figures of users, but how they have evolved compared to July 2024, a record year For Spanish tourism. He passenger flow Barajas for example grew 0.6% and Barcelona-the Prat 2.9%. In general, the airports of the country’s main tourist destinations experienced an increase in activity in July. In that of Malaga-Costa del Sol, the flow of travelers shot 7.8%, in Alicante 5.9%, in Ibiza 0.9%, in Gran Canaria 6.4%, in Tenerife South 1.4%and in Tenerife North 8.6%. Of course not everyone grew. ‘Palma’s airfield, where the passenger transfer fell 0.1%, Santiago, who suffered a 12.4%cut, or Santander and Vigo, which scored setbacks of 0.6%and 6.5%, respectively. Are they high data? Yes. Both in fact that some terminals have pulverized their historical maximums. “During the past month there has been an absolute record of passengers at the airports of Barajas, El Prat, Malaga-Costa del Sol, Alicante, Valencia, Bilbao and Tenerife Norte-Ciudad de la Laguna”, They clarify from Aenawhich also specifies that there are 16 airfields that have registered their best July. Why is it important? For several reasons. The main one because in summer a good part of the displacements are by leisure, which gives us another brushstroke to understand how the tourist season marches. The second reason is that Aena’s figures collide in part with others Shared by the hoteliers that suggest a summer with less activity and income than in 2024. The Association of Hotel Entrepreneurs of the Costa del Sol (AEHCOS) I noticed recently That July occupation levels were very similar to those of 2024 (87.82%, 1.16% above last year) but came accompanied by less income: the gross impact per customer fell according to their calculations from 198.61 to 157.18 euros. Facing August, the group expects the average occupation to be 4.57 percentage points lower than that of 2024, so it would stay at 88.32%. Are there more falls? Yes. The one on the Costa del Sol is not the only message that points to a less generous summer campaign than that of 2024. The Tenerife press It echoed These days that the establishments integrated in Ashotel closed Julio with an average occupancy level of 81.97% in the province of Santa Cruz de Tenerife. It is a high percentage that also improves the forecast of reservations that hoteliers handled in mid -June, but still almost two percentage points below July 2024. In Palma de Mallorca the employer speaks Not so much a fall in the flow of tourists as if of the spending in hospitality. What is the conclusion? Touch wait. Soon the INE will publish another interesting clue to take the temperature of the tourist campaign: its statistics of Hotel situation. At the moment the last available data, of June, reflects a 2.1% increase in overnight stays and an increase in both the occupancy level and, above all, in the rates. Waiting for the tourist balance to be outlined and knowing if Spain will finally reach this year the milestone of the 100 million tourists foreigners, there are some clear trends. The main is that the Spanish sector grows largely thanks to the flow of foreign visitors. Aena’s data does not allow to know if July passengers are Spanish or travelers from other countries, but we know that in 2024 foreign demand played A fundamental role In the balance of hotels. 7.5% grew … Read more

One of the greatest consultants has brought the war against teleworking to the extreme: a “traffic light” to control

by

PricewaterhouseCoopers multinational consultant (PWC) decided A little less than a year ago than The 100% Teleworking Era had ended. He joined the decisions that had adopted competitive companies such as EY. The striking of the movement were its conditions: it would geolocate their teleworkors to control that they were going to the office 60% of the day, the minimum amount that it now demanded (after having requested 40% until that moment). Now, thanks to Financial Times We know how they are carrying out control in their offices in the United Kingdom. Traffic lights. PWC measures have not only fallen into broken bag, but have intensified. Since April, the company is registering in a control panel the assistance and if the three days they demand at the week are passed in the office. To control compliance more visually, the company has established an indicator based on traffic light colors. Those employees who meet have a “green” in their state. The profile of those that drops from 60% has an amber, and those that fall from 40% have a red. In addition to the workers themselves, supervisors, heads of business units and directors have access to this traffic light. Thorough control. To verify that the employees go to the offices (OA meetings with customers, outside them), the company is carrying out a monitoring of the location of the wifi connections of the laptops. The data that is collected following this control is intended with the assistance or absence indicated in Workday, the software used for human resources issues, and in the personnel control sheets. In addition to the WiFi, PWC also has control of when employees pass their cards as an signing to enter and leave the offices. Policies against the old trick. The verification of assistance based on the entry and exit signings is something that many companies have carried out. Those employees who wanted to try to skip that control did something simple, according to a study: 58% of the workers employed under a hybrid work system went to the office, signed and then they left. Amazon already ended this picaresque establishing a minimum time to go to the office. Hey also reinforced Its access policies with lathes Checking that 50% of some teams breached the demands for assistance to their facilities. The control based on Wi -Fi connections is the brooch to these policies. Consequences. The question is what happens to employees who have a red or amber in their traffic light. And the internal guide for employees to which the Financial Times has accessed is clear: they face formal sanctions and a reduction of their performance in evaluations, where extra bonuses are played to their base salary. That same guide includes special exceptions or permits for family or disease reasons. Employee reactions. PWC workers are complaining so much about this scrutiny that a high -rank worker has told the Financial Times that he has lost his account of how many complaints he received. Employees are restless about tracking methods, and seek more transparency since the pressure to be fulfilled rose. It goes in the line of the best qualified employees in companies of the S&P 500: Rotation triggered by imposing face -to -face. According to a study by McKinsey, return to the office It is not enough to improve productivity. A company spokesman said that the control panel “guarantees that our people have easy access to their assistance data, so that they can manage and plan their time in a way that works for them, our equipment and our clients.” The paradox. The ‘Big Four’ have been serious with the return to the office, but they have always been in the spotlight of the management of extra hours, and Work fined them in Spain for having lacked time registration (mandatory by law since 2019) and for excess of day. The macro -inspection ended, at least 1.4 million euros that had to pay for different circumstances for social security fees. Image | Flickr (Raul Muñoz) and Carlos Alberto Gómez Iñiguez in Unspash In Xataka | The companies bet on the return to the office. Public administration keeps an ace in the sleeve: Teleworking

that you choose the news you want to see yourself

by

For months, the quality of Google’s results seems to have plummeted. Among sponsored results, pages aupadas thanks to SEO and a torrent of Content generated by AIfinding quality information has become an odyssey. Given these problems that have been very striking from Google, they wanted to pass the witness to the user to choose the way you want to inform yourself in your search engine. Google wants to solve your problem with AI. Through your official blogthe company has announced a new function called ‘favorite sources’ that will allow users to select the media they like best. In this way, the search results will first show the sources chosen by the users themselves. And they will all be included in these filters. From the big national headwaters, to local newspapers or niche blogs. Everything will enter this filter that will customize the feed showing the most relevant results in the ‘outstanding news’ section. A very easy to use feed control. This function will be available at first in the United States and India, and will subsequently expand to other countries. When it is active, next to the ‘outstanding news’ section a new icon will appear to select the means of trust. In this way, more and more news will be published by these media, and you can also enable A new section in the heading To directly access these favorite sources. Google will give tools to promote this measure. The means themselves will have the possibility of encouraging their readers to add them to this list of ‘favorites’. This will be done with a new button that will give the “Add as a preferred Google” source. Something that will be used to have a better organic traffic in the search engine. A battle for lost traffic. This movement comes in a delicate time. Google He has denied repeatedly that your commitment to AI and automatic summaries has damaged media trafficdespite the fact that the data even points to A reduction in clicks to half. The company has also ruled out that the results are getting worse because of the manipulation of the SEO or its own content generated by AI. Artificial intelligence is increasingly present. Right now Google is betting fully AI in all its productsand the truth is that we as users We are increasingly asking chatgpt or Gemini rather than doing a search on Google as before. This has caused new browsers focused on the Searchgpt, Perplexity or the Ai mode of Google that transforms the search engine to searches with natural language. Images | Firmbee.com In Xataka | Google is determined to win the war of smart watches with its AI. To achieve this, you will have to offer us a disruptive experience

Log In

Forgot password?

Forgot password?

Enter your account data and we will send you a link to reset your password.

Your password reset link appears to be invalid or expired.

Log in

Privacy Policy

Add to Collection

No Collections

Here you'll find all collections you've created before.